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BATON ROUGE—Gov. Bobby Jindal took a break today from the presidential campaign trail to come back to his state and celebrate the 1,000th preventable child death since he rejected the expansion of Medicaid in May 2013. The expansion of Medicaid would have been fully funded under the Affordable Care Act.

“Sounds like freedom,” said Jindal, as 7-year-old Kaylee Johnson was lowered into the ground at Sweet Briar Cemetery. Kaylee died on the weekend of pneumonia; her mother lacked health insurance and delayed taking Kaylee to the hospital for fear of falling further into debt. “The important thing,” said Jindal, “is that we’ve shown Washington that we here in Louisiana don’t believe in Big Government.”

Jindal had originally planned to return to the state on Sunday for the funeral of 4-year-old Bobby Wills, whose parents initially tried to treat his severe accidental burns at home, but Bobby hung on for “several days longer than expected,” according to aides, forcing a reshuffling of the schedule. “On the bright side, the Wills family lived way up in Coushatta, and we would have struggled to get the media out there,” said the aide.

Jindal, who is currently polling around 1% in the presidential race, wrote an op-ed piece in the Washington Post in May 2013, arguing that despite the initial full federal funding, Medicaid expansion would have ended up costing the state $1 billion over ten years, or about $21 per resident per year. The op-ed was well received, and many think that while Jindal has no hope of success in the current Republican presidential primary, he is now well-positioned for a book deal and possibly a commentary slot on Fox.

“WWJD,” said Jindal, as the last shovelfuls of dirt were heaped on Kaylee’s casket. “WWJD.”